Description and validation of the Affective Temperament Questionnaire.

Background: Akiskal and Mallya (Psychopharmacol Bull. 1987;23:68-73) proposed criteria defining 4 affective temperaments-hyperthymic, irritable, cyclothymic, and dysthymic. This study aims to develop and validate, using a 3-point rating scale, a short questionnaire that assesses these temperaments.

Relationships between angry-impulsive personality traits and genetic polymorphisms of the dopamine transporter.

Background: The 9-repeat variable number tandem repeat allele of the dopamine transporter has recently been associated with borderline personality disorder (BPD) in depressed patients.

Methods: We investigated the association between the 9-repeat allele of the dopamine transporter and angry-impulsive personality traits in a family study with 512 subjects on the molecular genetics of depression and personality.

Results: Across the whole sample, the 9-repeat allele of the dopamine transporter was associated with angry-impulsive personality traits (p = .

Bipolar disorder not otherwise specified: comparison with bipolar disorder I/II and major depression.

Objective: To compare the personality, clinical and comorbidity characteristics of subjects meeting diagnostic criteria for bipolar disorder not otherwise specified (BDNOS) to those with major depression and bipolar I or II disorder.

Methods: A family-based study was undertaken on the molecular genetics of depression and personality, in which the proband had been treated for depression, regardless of history, of hypomania or mania.

Results: The 25 subjects with BDNOS were different to the 297 subjects with major depression and similar to 75 subjects with bipolar I or II disorder on social phobia, obsessive-compulsive disorder and substance dependence comorbidity.

An association study of DRD2 and COMT polymorphisms with novelty seeking and harm avoidance scores, in two independent samples of depressed patients.

Background: It was recently reported that an interaction of the dopamine D2 receptor (DRD2) and catechol-O-methyltransferase (COMT) influences the behavioural approach system--as measured using Carver and White's Behavioural Inhibition and Behavioural Approach System (BIS/BAS) scales--in a sample of healthy German subjects. The Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI), in particular the novelty seeking (NS) and harm avoidance (HA) scales, correlates moderately with the BIS/BAS measure. This study aimed to examine support for an association of DRD2 and COMT with behavioural activation, using the TCI within two independent samples of depressed outpatients (for both samples n = 146).

Preliminary evidence for an association between a dopamine D3 receptor gene variant and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder in patients with major depression.

We have previously reported that the Ser9Gly dopamine D3 receptor (DRD3) polymorphism was associated with increased rates of obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) symptomology. We tested the replicability of this association within a further two independent groups of individuals with a history of depression, from a clinical sample (n = 149) and a family study (n = 213). The data from the replication samples and the original sample, within which the association was found, were compiled within a meta-analysis.